


Timedivers

by infernoforte



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Angst, Corporate Espionage, Crimes & Criminals, Dark, Double Agents, Drug Abuse, Drug Addiction, Drug Use, Drugs, Espionage, Hong Kong, M/M, Mafia AU, OT12 (EXO), Organized Crime, Undercover, Underworld, mafia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-12-10
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:22:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27667423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/infernoforte/pseuds/infernoforte
Summary: Lu Han is a double agent representing Hong Kong's Criminal Intelligence Bureau (CIB) Department, when a myriad of moles haunt the police force shortly after the murder of his former boss, he is set between a storm battling against the darkness of the underworld under the commands of a new Chief Inspector. At the end, money is but a path leading to destruction.
Relationships: Byun Baekhyun/Park Chanyeol, Do Kyungsoo | D.O/Kim Jongin | Kai, Huang Zi Tao | Z.Tao/Wu Yi Fan | Kris, Kim Jongdae | Chen/Kim Minseok | Xiumin, Kim Junmyeon | Suho/Zhang Yi Xing | Lay, Lu Han/Oh Sehun
Kudos: 12





	1. I | New Tact, New Measures

**Author's Note:**

> I N T R O
> 
> This fanfiction was planned in 2018, where I had the constant idea of a Spy Alternate Universe prompt, following the elements of Line Walker 1, don't fret if you find some scenes similar if you've watched the drama, I'm by no means taking credit of whatever resources I've extracted from it. Nevertheless, I didn't have the time to write this story back when I had the notion, nor did I enjoy writing it. But it's still an undeniably interesting topic, which I'd love to try.
> 
> D I S C L A I M E R
> 
> I wasn't an active EXO fan, and I no longer am at the slightest. I planned this when I was still roughly a part of the fandom, hence, I wrote this based on the fact that there are twelve members for me to explore and this sort of story generally needs a lot of characters and their development.
> 
> N O T E
> 
> Distinct from my original fiction, this story may or may not be updated on schedule, I'll let you know once I'm finished with a chapter so you could read when I post it. My fanfictions are always more of slow paced, I hope you are patient with it.
> 
> I N S P I R A T I O N
> 
> Line Walker 1
> 
> James Bond's Dr. No
> 
> T I M E L I N E
> 
> Started on: December 2018
> 
> Finished: Subject to completion

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I

N E W  
T A C T

N E W  
M E A S U R E S

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The night before they die Lu Han dreams. He dreams about Sehun, how he cries and how he pretends to be fearless, he dreams of going to Milan, knowing Rome isn't far away and he imagines the breath of coffee shops lined along the asphalt surrounding where he is still far from. He dreams of the safe house he has dwelled in, how the scent of Sehun's cologne are still stained on the bed sheets and their only monument left is the abode with peeling paint revealing crumbled cements.

Before anything has started, the head of Criminal Intelligence Bureau of Hong Kong discovered their nearly invaded secrecy of undercover subordinates, proceeding to delete the database. It was exactly nine months before June 2015, the identities of five unknown agents were lost, resulting in conflicts, and the disclosure of moles among themselves.

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Someone wrote the story when they were in Hong Kong. Because who wouldn’t when they were not more than ordinary high school students earlier. And it was plain, something people think they should remember it themselves instead of shelving their life one day in the national library, talking about the history of counterfeit Hollywood horsemen slaughtering villains to save the day. Instead of saving countless of lives. Writers didn't amaze themselves by recording biographies related with espionage.

Lu Han isn't a person in those tales, he is more than a movie, less than the world. They don't readily call him a hero, because they only see him as a being who occasionally jogs a few streets across Portland Street, who buys tea for breakfast every morning because he despises Americano, who once performed "Ink On Sakura" with the piano during the music festival in the metropolis. He is nothing more than a citizen granted Hong Kong's permanent residency.

Until one day the district is oddly bothering, pitiful gasps and sweltering adrenaline, dark clouds and grey sky, skyscrapers blocking more sunlight from penetrating through than they have ever. The news is fulgent, too hurting the eye, the voice of the news reporter too sharp whilst driving the dagger, the colors too monochromic, the weather too hot and too cold at the same time. He blinks so as to make sure he isn't seeing things.

"...approximately on 22:00 last night, August 30th, Sir Kang from CIB department of the state has been confirmed to have commited suicide, landing severely injured after dropping from a twenty-storey high building. Investigators are currently working on the case," and there comes the weather report, as though the news were train screeching past a collapsing station with passengers assured of hopeless safety as a matter-of-fact lie, as though the death were a mere lost and found case on the reception counter waiting to be claimed.

▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀

When Lu Han was in Macau, year 2013, it was one of the hot summer nights, cicada singing among the trees and a mobbed aisle traffic. The task was to hunt down a professional clerk whose mask hid a face of illegal laundering and drug use. "Sir, in one minute I'm ruling this table, all you have is," he clicked his tongue, eyes searching and his hair smooth, not leaving a tad scrap of a CIB agent. "Your tongue. Convince me, I'll share." With that, a stash of paper notes was smacked across the table as promised.

Eyes still on the money, the man opposite grinned, his lips curling within a flip of a poker card, spotlights diffusing through his thin fingers stained with tar and heroin. "Just how much can I believe this is not one of your games?"

"As much as you already have."

His chortle was husky, maybe filtered through black chains of cartilages with coal, then burnt to crisps like fossils. Muttering something about how he liked Lu Han's fraud, a person he looked for, or anything besides. "I could use a little catalyst as you. Easily." Lu Han's earpiece was a beetle coat of black, buried behind spiky hair.

"Oh, can you?"

"Easily. I said." It was a pitched sneer, his cigarette joint dropping and rolling to the far end of his chair. But a beam and Lu Han was laughing too, wheezing and tears burning behind eyes because it was funny. Inside the casino, the clinking of glasses never died out, smoke around the bar swept in and pressured out, a pleasant sight to have actually existed among anesthetics.

"Use me, then."

Everything after it ended was convincing, Sir Kang's secret meet up in another five-star hotel, prosaic conversations and deserved buffet. Depraved abnegation made up with million dollar entourage, endless paper notes asked, anything else besides a glorifying crop photo on the newspaper. But Lu Han was more than satisfied.

That was the last time he ever saw Sir Kang, of Hong Kong's Criminal Intelligence Bureau, of his reason numero uno in saving the world, of his ego and pride and a book where he was taught.

▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀

Months later, Lu Han receives a package delivered to the furthest of places where anyone can find-a library where he works in. It is not one of the options from anyone replacing Sir Kang, not necessarily. The box has a fort of styrofoam, unimpressive plastics rolled into something akin to old tissue paper, like it was dug from the soil undergoing draught, filthy and prolly, unimpressive.

He rumbles through the thick layers of wrapping, finally setting his eyes on a rusty, plastic buttoned mobile phone from the 1990s. Holding it up, he frowns with the display of a text message. Morse code. His fingers strike the table, decrypting the symbols.

"I'm your new boss. Glass tower, west wing, October 11, 2pm. We'll meet there." Gaze flitting at his watch, it claims that it is indeed, 11th of October today. Two hours until the vowed clock tick, his chair is already knocked aside and his bomber slipping on. It isn't a particularly explicit request, but Lu Han knows his life as a spy has never ended.

▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀

"Xi Lu Han." Kim Minseok sits at one end of the well polished, finely carved wooden long table, his scrutinizing gaze penetrating every bit of the oddly deafening hall, Lu Han tries to capture a small part of the inexplicably captivating glare of his so-called new boss, reflecting it to the dark, cracked ceilings and the obnoxiously thin walls. When seen from afar, the casement behind Minseok has its curtains drawn wide apart, offering a silhouette none more than what an unexceptional and stereotypical businessman would own, it gives rather a sense of solitude diffusing into the racks of old records on the sides, into the carved wood beneath his own tapping fingers, into Lu Han's smoothened hair, his tie, and everywhere else besides.

"Boss Kim, undercover Xi Lu Han reporting." Lu Han's features tighten, lines of doubt appearing a little vague in the dim lighting, they're too shallow to actually convince their own presence. But Minseok notices every slight, improbable details of his countenance, just like the ones from all the people, high and low, whoever he knows. Lu Han flits off the rampant, rushing urge of drawing a dagger out of his pocket and slice the harrowingly disturbing while amused grin that crawls across Minseok's visage, lifting the corner of his thin, deceiving lips. It almost seems as though a thousand of minutes have passed until Minseok lifts his chin and drops the smile.

"You're looking too pale of an undead, well, as I was about to say, you are supposed to be dead." As Minseok uncovers his tenacity of again, solemn humor, which kind of amazes Lu Han in such a way that his frown softens as if it has never been there, unseen by the outshone racks of old records, unseen by the chandelier hanging down the low-maintenance ceiling stained by leaks. It isn't a language between undercovers of any kind, but it definitely is something you wouldn't find in a million of people you meet, that however mind-boggling Minseok seems at the get-go, this is where the thought is cut.

"To whom?"

"Whoever is behind the murder of your former boss." Minseok leans forwards, allowing the other to observe the scrutiny painted across his face to a further extent, with half of the shadows creeping out and light scattering in, not only his gaze come to Lu Han as being sharp, but his edges, his spiky hair the corners of his suit almost brings about the thought of inevitable, pricking pain if he closes the gap between them. The quickened tap of Minseok's fingers on the table snaps Lu Han from the sonderingly vivid contemplation. "You see, we all know the deletion of certain databases regarding undercovers in the CIB department, followed by the suicide involving Kang. But while we struggle to forget such history, we're perpetually avoiding one critical question-why did this happen?"

"Unless, it wasn't a suicide." A crisp, unfamiliar voice sounds. Lu Han averts his gaze across his shoulders, knowing it doesn't come from his boss, though the shadows still shelter pretty much his whole complexion. Trudges of heels against sturdy cement radiates past the shelves and echoes back to the person who emerges amidst the gradual pour of light, he has a casual pace of vague sensibility and plasticity, controversial accent and blonde hair dyed several shades too pale. As pale as his frosty skin.

Minseok leans back into his armchair, massaging his neck in a playful manner, but the grin at the corner of his lips is telling. "Yi Xing."

"Undercover Yi Xing reporting." The person returns evenly, which comes to Lu Han in a bit of a shock. It isn't common to have spies like them to know the existence of each other, let alone meeting in a rendezvous. The more the merrier, but the merrier the deadlier. Because there are still moles among them, and either of them could be one.

The silence is eating everything away. Their heavy breaths, their sanity, and their trust. Lu Han thinks he wouldn't be surprised if anyone proceeds to launch at him, tearing his organs into shreds. It doesn't come as a fiasco, it is already a norm in the world he's gotten to know.

However, Minseok gestures them to sit down, both the polished chairs are arranged neatly in front of them. Yi Xing doesn't seem suspicious, if the composure and lack of interest he's displayed were any indication. "It might be strange, how I act differently from your former boss," Minseok begins, tone light as a feather. "But it's much obvious the moment you work together, the imposter could either be so good at pretending to you, that I would be able to notice, or vice versa."

"How're you so sure that it's easier?" Lu Han frowns, perspiration forming on his forehead.

"Like technology, moles have limitations. They can't lie to every one. And there's an obvious reason to why I'm calling only the two of you here," Minseok pauses with his eyes searching, as though they could penetrate through the consciousness of the two that sends shiver down Lu Han's spine. "You two are the only ones I don't doubt a single bit."

Lu Han could almost figure out the smirk between Yi Xing's sentence. "How'd you know? I might pull the trigger once you turn your back on us," he glances sideways at Lu Han, adding. "Or he might."

"I'd like to see you try." Minseok says dryly.

Yi Xing shrugs, clearly dissatisfied. "Shame, I run for Justice League."

For a split second, it's a conundrum for Lu Han altogether. Perplexed because the new boss seems more like a brisk, down to earth character and by the time he gets used to the new measures, Sir Kang is more of a feeble memory forgotten as a stack of books hidden far enough at the corner. While Yi Xing, other than being somewhat smug, is nowhere near the label of a hostile person, just a little cunning and obnoxious.

" - this isn't a game, not entirely." Minseok drawls on, harrowingly dragging Lu Han into the attention he is deprived of. "But this task is easy as any James Bond's, bring minimal weapon so none of us gets into trouble," he smooths his hair and taps on what seems like a complex flow chart. "Take your pick, I need only one of you disguised as a dealer, the other would be on track and taking control at the right timing."

Lu Han squints at the map, obliterated scrawls of black ink cascading down white pulp, in his peripherals Yi Xing's arms are folded idly across his chest. He isn't sure what and when to voice up when Yi Xing takes the step first. "You go first, Lu."

Wincing at the mention, Lu Han traces his fingers across the sinking paper. It feels frictionless, his lips curl, a taste of the filthy rich and luxury that has always lingered at the back of his mind gradually unravels, as he finds himself say. "I'll disguise. Been there countless of times under Sir Kang."

"Great, I'll be hauling the force in on your mark. Perfect timing, under Sir Kang as well." Yi Xing replies almost immediately, his eyes glinting at the word timing. It is particularly strange for Lu Han that the both of them, who barely know each other in less than an hour, have come into terms that easily, so easily that it reeks of carelessness.

Minseok claps his hands briskly, and it comes out as some sort of congratulations for the compact recently formed. "I'll be expecting you both next week before the mission, so before that, look things up from scrapes, but skim through them. All you need is the rules and regulations of The Boranaic Bar, that's how you get in, anyway."

Lu Han nods, scribbling away in his mind. However, Yi Xing looks a little lost, or does he have more thoughts?

"That's a little too scarce, isn't it? Making a fool out of ourselves in a bar." Yi Xing finally says, as though exhaling a heap of stones along with tobacco.

"You forgot what I told you, the swiftest way to squeeze through lies is to work closely with it," Minseok chuckles, licking his dry lips like a starving predator, all shrewd and scheme rolling in one. "Suspicions don't raise from the inside, and we're going to flay them inside out."

"Sounds like a plan to me." Lu Han grazes his teeth, flashing an incoherent grin at Minseok. Though the people around him changes, along with their ways, his roguish attempt doesn't. Surviving in the dingy, isolated space between the agency and mafias all these years have long compressed him into a walking weapon, one pull of the trigger penetrates any living criminals near him, and that isn't going to change. Not by the ambience, and certainly not by a person.

So Yi Xing asks, still unsure. "Who's our main target this time?"

Lu Han could almost trace the smirk that lifts off Minseok's demeanor, as his own mirrors it around the most perfect of ways possible. "Oh Sehun."


	2. Red Wings, Blue Feathers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I’ve been watching dramas involving Hong Kong’s Narcotics Bureau (NB) and I’m sort of merging the storyline with Criminal Intelligence Bureau (CIB), since in situations, they can work together. They’re quite interesting and knowing the tactics of organizations such as “High Table Club”, along the way guessing their next moves (I seriously read and watch too many materials regarding this topic, so their progress is almost always expected, lol).

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II

R E D  
W I N G S

B L U E  
F E A T H E R S

┗━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━┛

"I don't understand," says Yi Xing waspishly, tossing his jacket aside as it hangs relentlessly down the chair, a long ghostly shadow cascading down at the abraded floorboards.

Minseok has arranged an underground working studio for their more often than not meet ups, it is pleasantly spacious, all four walls far enough from each other to paste fluorescent notes and photos over. Lu Han watches the dusted, shabby contraptions that line across the inside of one glass case opposite the entrance, wondering if they're useful at all or plainly decorations to heighten their mood.

"What don't you understand?" Lu Han yawns, disoriented tufts of his hair falling into his eyes.

"This Sir Kim, ain't he too risky?" Yi Xing's finger pummels on the stack of papers they both have been gathering, rigid as it is, a blot of ridges starts forming on the white parts between paragraphs.

Lu Han stops fumbling the sets of copies in his hands momentarily, blinking. "It might be a good idea, we get to know each other and we could watch our backs."

"Not that, not necessarily. Honestly, Lu, I'd prefer it knowing you outside dirty business." He chuckles heartily.

"Don't fucking banter me, I'm a double agent, not a ragged doll." Lu Han grits tersely, earning a wide eyed stare followed by a laugh of amusement from Yi Xing.

"No, really. Do you even want to acquaint with anyone in a circle, lose them, and go in circles again?"

A wheel behind Lu Han's mind stops spinning, he grisly stares into Yi Xing's blank eyes, features stark. He couldn't help but let his fists clench as much as his heart does, before releasing a breath lodged at his throat. "No. But I trust what Sir Kim does isn't gormless, though the outcome's still murky.”

Yi Xing shrugs, unable to contemplate a plausible reason to back out of their mission.

"So, what do we know about that bar?" He asks, wrapping his hands around the mug of coffee on the table.

"It's run by an organization called Redwing. Aside from being an organization of notorious drug dealers and owners of the biggest chain of casinos, I don't think we've got anything much." Lu Han shrugs, marking his notes with a few important points revolving around one centre figure - Oh Sehun. Based on the photos they collected, Sehun looks like any other billionaire's influential inheritor, hands on the company with the finest face one could ask for.

"That's more than enough," says a brisk voice, which sends them both tumbling off their chairs and facing the tunnel leading upstairs with their handguns pointed to the dark, they lower in parallel as the figure emerges through splatters of light rays, a stub of lit cigarette dangling leisurely between the man's lips.

"Instinct of a double agent's," he inhales with a strong hint of ecstasy, smirking between smithereens of cigarette ashes. "Couldn't miss a beat, I see. Charming." It is Minseok, Lu Han reckons as he inches closer into the room, their grips loosen.

Yi Xing inclines his head in disbelief, breathing in and out as though he's deprived of air from the unexpected interrogation. However, Minseok lays down several stolen photographs of what seems like a scene behind the backdrop of Redwing, a few faces Lu Han recognizes as members he has looked up on, a faint scent of torpor that smells deeper than displayed into the pixels.

"I believe this is what you're diving into, so you should probably think straight, because once in, there's no backing out." Minseok's syllables are scorching hot against Lu Han's neck, eradicating any fear that's been stowed beneath determination, but his eyes are still glinting.

"Sir Kim," he smiles morosely, trying not to reveal too much of flaked scar that cuts through thin air. "How many people have you lost in this storm of the underworld?"

Minseok looks intense, like the thought of having a bullet pierce through his heart is more of an experience than a threat, that his life owes a thousands of others' hitherto. Fear is no longer a drawback, fear is a strength. "More than I can count, maybe I count when I'm not talking from the second I wake up, and I wouldn't be finished by the time I scramble into bed."

Lu Han nods, as a glimpse of terror washes across Yi Xing's complexion. "And I stand by the reason that these lives don't go to waste. I'm in for the task, not out of valiance, but because everyone's a victim at one point, that there ought to be someone taking the first step to put this to an end."

Minseok lays a firm hand on his shoulder, grimly acceding. "Yes, there're always heroes of their own. Keep in mind we're backing you up, I know it's inevitable, but it's better to keep lunging to the surface before deciding you'd drown."

"I know I'm the only one who's still convinced that this is batshit crazy," Yi Xing starts, navigating his way back to the table again and sitting down with a clatter. "But fine, I'll do whatever I can to save your ass if you ever bump into trouble, so make sure you steer clear of any ships you might end up having with the people inside, especially this hot bloke here," he adds, tapping Oh Sehun's monochromatic appearance on the old film roll. "Because I'll make sure to sink every single one of them before you can spell 'homo'."

"Piss off." Lu Han shoots back darkly.

Beside him, Minseok chortles again, offering a pat of concern on his shoulder. "While I strongly suggest the most of courteous bonds you form with them so things are less complicated, Yi Xing's right. Inevitable pretending often leads to irreversible attachment. I trust your judgement whatsoever, so stay vigilant. All right?"

Lu Han returns with an easy smirk playing on his lips. "Not to worry, I'll be back reporting before you even know it. Tomorrow night, that is."

-

Redwing's headquarters, as it appears beneath the well-known Boranaic Bar, is at an underground hall roughly tailing Backstreet 223, between uncanny shop lots that lead up to five storeys of height, a mediocre disguise from the setting sun. Lu Han, hid under a distinctive black cap and donned in an attire which he supposes, is bastardized enough the way it holds the dangling chains that clammer every so often with the slightest movement. His back slumps against the metal door that probably blocks any wave signals from reaching beyond it, and sets forth when a man dressed nearly as muggy as he is, his hair an intense tousle of electric blue, arrives at the entry.

"Hey, git." Lu Han says smoothly.

The person flicks his gaze at him with vague irritation, before swinging out what seems like a glorifying chain of keys with identifying stickers. "What do you want?"

"I need to see Oh Sehun."

"You what?" A hint of amusement is buried in his undertone, his eyes grey with ill-humored mock.

"I'm here for business, you know." Lu Han smirks.

"Everyone's here for business, I don't know if our leader would be interested in people without so much as a little name -"

"Oh, I certainly do," Lu Han couldn't help but chuckle triumphantly over the puzzled demeanor the person spits at his reply. Dignity. "I'm Zero Gravity, Macao, 2013, I ruled the table worth the most of fortune before one of us got captured."

The man pales, rambling the door as he mumbles how he's forgotten his key. "You're Zero Gravity? You should've said this sooner, I'm Kai, by the way."

Slowly but surely, Lu Han's smile stretches into a subdued, fleeting grimace. Convincing is too easy, in a world government by paper notes. Rules and regulations is just another term for interest. So the moment he reaches Oh Sehun's office - as he notices, the conjured hall doesn't unfold the same way in his mind, partitions are made solely for a sense of corrupted richness, money in the loo, money at the ceilings, money piled for the couch and money in their desiring eyes clouded of anesthetics and stupor - he knows exactly how it's going to play out.

Sehun sits, chin tilted precisely forty-five degrees from the horizontal, buried in his top-notch, gleaming leather chair, fingers crossed in front of his finely etched countenance. The air inside reeks of his cologne, his hair a mop of silver underneath artificial, fickling ceiling lamp, his lips are carved a tinge of glossy pink.

"The infamous Zero Gravity, what brings you so eager to my humble, underground cavern?" He remarks, thumbing a stack of clipped paper with a constant applause. Lu Han sees, through sheets and sheets of thin ice coating Sehun's gaze, that he isn't as curious as he sounds.

"Sir, I trust that we have the same motive." He simply replies.

"And what might that be?"

Lu Han leans towards the other side of the desk that parts them both, almost whispering in Sehun's ear with his fervent breath as their distance closes. He watches in utter enjoyment when Sehun's pupils dilate like an abyss ready to suck him in. "Mutual compact, mutual profit. How I ruled the table in Macao, you may ask. If you let me in, all of us could share that reputation in decades to come."

He backs away, peripherals registered on Redwing's big signature emblem on his right, standing upright inside the protective glass. It portrays a falcon with red wings and the rest of its body covered in blue plumage. They stay silent as Sehun finishes reviewing the contract.

He scribbles a barely legible row of initials on the borderline below "signed", with the blackest of inks and lightest of writings. "This organization is directly below me, so I hope you know that if, by mistake or deliberate act, you fuck this up, we both would burn in hell, and I won't hesitate to kick your ass even then."

"Trust me, I really only want the wealth as much as you do." Lu Han scribbles his own initials at the other borderline. And that is that. He is Redwing.

-

"You never told me you had a reputation in the underworld stock market." Yi Xing complains sulkily, pinning the new photographs he's printed while Lu Han was out. But Minseok's sudden blast of intertwined thoughts takes precedence.

"Have you gathered anything significant?"

"I've some past records copied in this," Lu Han tosses Yi Xing a USB disc, his arms continue to fold in front of his chest over his well pressed suit. "Heroin, cocaine, marijuana, they even sell weed."

"Drug dealers are that typical," Yi Xing prods the USB into the drive, eyes darting around the screen. "They do and buy what makes them feel good."

"There's no point acting now, so stay put." Minseok waves his hand to dismiss the burning intention Yi Xing gives away. "Meanwhile, Lu Han, since you're in the position of arranging their trading dates, do your best to update us on that. You know what to do when we turn up, so don't get caught."

"Won't raise a doubt. If anything, I have good news. I don't know how it's possible, but Sehun got me arrange a time slot next Wednesday to send marijuana to the northern military base, saying it's for Camp Alpha." Lu Han explains, a little perplexed.

"Redwing's been selling drugs to the army?" Minseok looks as clueless as he is.

"Liberty at its finest, smoldering filth everywhere," Yi Xing snorts, and shortly after a long pause, stands flabbergasted. "The fuck..."

"What?" Lu Han scuttles to the seat next to him, followed by Minseok.

"Needless to mention the military now, they've been sending drugs to our headquarters. Look," Yi Xing points at a line of words squeezed between spreadsheets on the computer screen, at the end of his fingers lies the very address of the Police Headquarters in Arsenal Street. "You're right, there're moles among us."

"But who?"

"Not who. It doesn't exist as a person, it exists in a chain." Minseok chuckles, a little too blatant, sending the both of them pallid in the face.

Yi Xing's shoulders drop tensely. "It's never going to end, is it?"

"Nothing really does, you know." This time, Lu Han is speaking a few nanoseconds earlier than Minseok. There comes a perpetual song of cicadas, disgruntling from the entrance, perpetual like the dives into endless time of what Lu Han holds as a responsibility than a will, what Yi Xing disregards as the justice he's always proclaimed to be the ultimate resolution. It doesn't end, but that's what distinguishes the world the long way round.

"Don't be carried away by it too soon. You still have a long way to go with Oh Sehun's splendid nouveau riche community, smudged hands and faces." Minseok says, through the most casual of ways.

Lu Han feels his lips twirl. "Oh, yes. And his hell of an ass."


End file.
